


"Here, Drink This. You'll Feel Better."

by impulse_baker



Series: 100 Ways to Say 'I Love You' [18]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Boys In Love, Dean Winchester Has a Cowboy Kink, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff and Angst, M/M, fixing 13x13
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-13
Updated: 2018-02-13
Packaged: 2019-03-17 19:02:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,783
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13665309
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/impulse_baker/pseuds/impulse_baker
Summary: Dean's cowboy kink flares up.Also...Gabriel.GABRIEL.





	"Here, Drink This. You'll Feel Better."

Their last hunt was two days ago. Sam, Dean, Cas, and Jack successfully took down a small nest of vampires in Alabama who had drawn attention to themselves at a neo-Nazi gathering that was getting relatively small new coverage. The racist blood suckers made small waves when they suggested blatant vampiric treatment of those they considered ‘less than’. The hunters found particular joy in cutting them down.

Team Free Will 2.0 was feeling pretty good right about now. They were in the Bunker having a Heath Ledger movie marathon because Dean couldn’t just let Jack go on without the brilliance of _A Knight’s Tale_.

Paul Bettany had just made his epic introduction for Sir Ulrich when Castiel flinched and brought his hand up to his forehead, as if trying to focus on something in his head. At the same time, Jack’s eyes flashed gold momentarily and he turned to look at Cas as if to confirm what he just felt.

“Cas? Cas, what is it?” Dean and Sam traded a look and he placed a gentle hand on his angel’s arm. It was instinctive at this point, the urge to touch, especially when Cas was in any form of distress.

“I…there was a sudden immense surge of _something_ over angel radio. But it was so brief and…I am clueless as to what it was.”

“It felt familiar to me, except there was something different.” Jack stood up and walked to the tv and stopped. He turned back around with confusion and something resembling pain etched into his expression.

“Familiar in what way?”

“It felt a little bit like when Lucifer was trying to reach out to me, before I was born. It was so similar to that…but…better? It wasn’t…it wasn’t _dark_ the way it used to feel.”

This raised red flags in everyone’s minds and Dean was ready to go into action. If Lucifer was trying to reach Jack again, it was a matter of time before he found some way to find him, warded Bunker or not.

In the end, Dean was convinced by the rest of the room that they needed a plan rather than going by their playbook favorite and making it up as they went along.

They agreed that they could take their chances with looking for the source of what they were calling ‘the call’. If it turned out to be him, they would try to kill him. If it wasn’t him, they had enough power between the four of them to face it. They recruited Kevin’s help, since as a Prophet, apparently, he was like a celestial energy compass.

 

 

Their road trip took them all the way to Quitaque, Texas. Dean raised an eyebrow at the rearview mirror in Kevin’s direction when signs for a state park came up.

“Yeah keep going. It’s getting closer.”

“What, Lucifer, or whoever is out here camping? Hiking?”

“Dean, there is no need for sarcasm. We need to find whoever this is.” Castiel chided him from the back seat and this time Dean turned around to say something, but his angel’s challenging face was enough to make him return his eyes to the road. He decided he would ignore the way Sam was trying to hold back his chuckle.

“Laugh it up, fuzzball.” He muttered barely above a whisper.

 

They parked outside the park office, and Dean and Cas went inside to talk to the park rangers while Sam stayed with Jack, who was trying to see if he could focus in on anything out of the ordinary.

Dean regretted not having his Stetson. This would have been a perfect opportunity to place Texas Rangers again. Cas’ Kilmer impression, however unfortunate, absolutely did things to Dean below the belt.

 

Nobody in the office was aware of anything or anyone strange, but they were happy to let Dean and Cas investigate the grounds. They even offered their horses to assist, and there was no way in _any_ conceivable universe that Dean would turn down a chance to ride horses with Cas through a bunch of canyons while pretending to be official officers of any sort. It was hugely unfortunate that they didn’t have their hats or his boots or bolo tie, but he would play out his little fantasy to any extent he could. He accepted before his angel had a chance to say anything. It didn’t matter that he wasn’t sure he knew how to ride a horse. He had plenty of experience with mechanical bulls. This couldn’t be harder than that, right?

Turns out it was nothing like riding a mechanical bull except that Dean was seated with his legs spread wide and he had to hold on for dear life. Castiel, on the other hand, looked completely at ease, almost like he was one with the glossy black mare. Dean had no regrets, though. This was a fantasy come to life, and he knew his angel wouldn’t let him get into any stupid horse related accidents.

Sam, Jack and Kevin drove to the lower trails to look there while Dean and Cas rode through the steeper trails. Dean was a little anxious to split up when there was so much uncertainty around what they were dealing with, but it was much more efficient to cover more ground this way and if anyone could break through his stubbornness, it was Castiel on a horse.

 

“He would calm down significantly if you relaxed a little, Dean.”

“What?” The hunter’s cheeks flushed a little at the thought of being caught maybe checking out the way Cas’ shoulder’s shifted as he guided the reigns.

“Your horse. Your anxiety is making him agitated. It would be better for both of you if you trusted him and eased the tension in your body a bit.”

“Oh, and you’re a horse expert now?”

“Yes, I am very familiar with equine biology and neurology, actually.”

Dean just rolled his eyes, but a smile tugged the corners of his lips. This, working a case with his angel, riding through red canyons of all things, was all Dean wanted. This was where his happiness came from.

They rode on for close to two hours before his phone rang. He answered and put it on speaker.

“Yeah Sammy?”

His brother’s voice on the other end was hurried and anxious. He looked at Castiel, whose eyes had gotten large and worry knit his brows together.

As soon as he hung up the phone, he and Cas galloped off to find everyone else.

 

As they neared, Dean could see Sam and Jack standing by the open back door of the Impala, and Kevin in the passenger side with his head lolled against the open window. There, in the backseat, was someone stretched out, sleeping.

Castiel gracefully dismounted and offered his hand to Dean to help him off and then slowly, hesitantly, approached the man in the backseat.

“Gabriel.” He breathed, and Dean could see how affected he was. Cas had told him a few stories he still remembered about the archangel being one of his only brothers that he felt a real fraternal rapport with.

His eyelids were swollen and dark. His face, that Dean could only remember being permanently smug, was decorated with similar bruising and cuts that couldn’t be that old. His hair was matted with dirt and blood, just like his threadbare clothing. It was leagues away from the Gabriel that Dean had in his memory, he was almost incredulous that it was the same dick bag in front of him.

 

Castiel and Jack sat up front on the ride home while Sam held Gabriel’s sleeping form against his side in the back seat next to Kevin. There weren’t a lot of words being said on this leg of the journey and all Dean could offer to his angel was silent comfort and a hand on his thigh. Maybe if Jack wasn’t on his other side, he would have whispered something more meaningful. Maybe he would have held his hand. Maybe he would have put his whole arm around him.

But the audience and heavy atmosphere in the Impala prevented Dean from doing any of the things he really wanted to do. His angel was distraught, and he was doing next to nothing to ease that away. He promised himself he would do something as soon as they were home.

 

 

Sam and Cas helped Gabriel clean up and get into some clothes that weren’t bloody and were still holding up. They gave him a room close to Sam’s and he went to sleep pretty much as soon as he was dressed.

Jack had a lot of questions, but Dean was thankful that the kid had enough tact to wait until a better time. Sam stayed with the archangel, sitting in a chair with a book, saying he would be there _just in case_. Dean wasn’t sure in case of what, but he was much more worried about how Cas was doing, so he set out to keep his promise and do something more concrete to help him.

 

“Here, drink this. You’ll feel better.” Dean held out a steaming mug to his slouched angel and joined him on the couch.

Castiel accepted it and looked into its contents and huffed out something small, resembling a laugh.

“I was half expecting something alcoholic.”

“Nah, one alcoholic in the family is enough. Hot cocoa is a much better way to drink away the feelings.” Dean smiled and _finally_ threw an arm around him.

They sat in silence for a long time. Cas sipping on his drink and Dean sitting there, stroking his thumb over his angel’s bicep and waiting for him to talk.

“I hardly recognized him for a second. Not just his vessel, that was obviously damaged. But, his Grace, Dean. I…it was…his Grace was like a sad imitation of what it was. I need to know how he is alive, and what did that to him.”

He didn’t say anything beyond that, and Dean understood. Sure, the archangel had done some messed up shit to the Winchesters, but he turned out to be one of the biggest allies they had, and he couldn’t ignore what he meant to Cas. He was his brother. If he found Sam like that, he would hunt every damn thing that went bump in the night until he found the fucker that messed him up that bad.

So yeah, he got it. He would help Cas get to the bottom of this.

But until then, he would be right there with as much hot chocolate as his angel needed, holding him as close as he would allow.

**Author's Note:**

> GABRIEL!GABRIEL!GABRIEL!GABRIEL!GABRIEL!GABRIEL!GABRIEL!GABRIEL!GABRIEL!GABRIEL!GABRIEL!GABRIEL!GABRIEL!GABRIEL!GABRIEL!GABRIEL!GABRIEL!GABRIEL!GABRIEL!GABRIEL!GABRIEL!GABRIEL!GABRIEL!GABRIEL!GABRIEL!GABRIEL!GABRIEL!GABRIEL!
> 
> This is my version of how things go in this universe where there isn't a big mess with Asmodeus and the apocalypse AU and Mary and that weird stuff that happened with Lucifer and Sister Jo. TBH I want her on the throne in Heaven, not Luci. I hate what BuckLemming did with them.
> 
> Thanks for reading!
> 
> Previous work: "Watch Your Step."  
> Next work: "Can I Hold Your Hand?"


End file.
